1) VROOOM; 2) Frame By Frame; 3) Sex, Sleep,
Eat, Drink, Dream; 4) Red; 5) One Time; 6) BʼBoom; 7) THRAK; 8) Improv: Two
Sticks; 9) Elephant Talk; 10) Indiscipline; 11) VROOOM VROOOM; 12) Matte
Kudasai; 13) The Talking Drum; 14) Larksʼ Tongues In Aspic, Part II; 15)
Heartbeat; 16) Sleepless; 17) People: 18) BʼBoom (reprise); 19) THRAK.
General verdict: Excellent live document of the Double Trio
period, but fairly short on surprises of any kind.
This live album, subtitled The Official Bootleg, was allegedly released as a remedy to the
evil circulation of a poor quality Italian bootleg documenting the Double Trioʼs
Argentinian shows (which does make one wonder if Robert Fripp was so far out of
touch with the world that he had never seen a King Crimson bootleg prior to
1995). It may be worth noting that the Discipline
lineup did not put out a live album upon dissolving at all (Absent Lovers would not see the light
of day until 1998), let alone all those almost defiantly short and not
particularly representative live albums from the Seventies — as if one of the
greatest live progressive rock acts of all time believed that The Time Has Not Yet
Come for the entire world to absorb all that awesomeness, and that all those
tapes, diligently recorded and preserved, should be allowed to stew and ferment,
biding their time... and now, all those hopes and dreams quashed by some Italian
bootlegger. (For the record, the bootlegger was eventually tracked down, hacked
in little pieces, and scattered all across the country with each limb bearing a
tag saying THE CRIMSON KING SAYS HELLO. Police are still trying to crack the
case.)
Anyway, as it stands, BʼBoom now holds the dubious honor of having been the very first
ever officially released King Crimson live album to be fully representative of
a contemporary touring event — 26 years after the groupʼs formation. For
longstanding fans of the band, this must have been a very significant event,
but, of course, in retrospect it has been completely overshadowed by the flood
of archival releases. The Double Trio period was hardly the most liked period
in the bandʼs history, and today the relevance of the album will essentially
depend on how damn hard you want to hear most of the material from THRAK performed live. To be frank, I do
not hear a whole world of difference, the way it would be between the Discipline-era studio records and Absent Lovers. Either this is because
they had already seriously emphasized the aggressive RAWK aspect of the songs
in the studio, or because technology had reached such a level that they were
now able to perfectly reproduce on stage all of their studio effects, something
that was not quite there yet in the mid-Eighties — probably both reasons.
The only track that is significantly different
is ʽBʼBoomʼ itself, seriously stretched out past its original running length —
but this is largely because it consists of an initial atmospheric-ambient part,
which can be easily extended to any length it takes to keep the psychedelic
haze strong, and a following drum duet, which can be easily extended to any
length it takes to let the people decide who kicks more ass, Bruford or Mastelotto.
For that matter, to keep things fair and just there is also a bass duet here — ʽImprov:
Two Sticksʼ is a surprisingly tender exchange of amicable sentiments between Levinʼs
and Gunnʼs instruments, kept short and sweet. On the whole, though, there is a
surprisingly small amount of improvisation, which almost gives the album a
mock-commercial feel; the non-concert goers would have to wait until THRaKaTTaK to learn how deeply they
were mistaken in thinking that Fripp & The Gang had decided to take it easy
and transform themselves into a bunch of pop song performers. (Here, the little
improvised bit in the middle of ʽTHRAKʼ is just some harmless marimba fun).
Other than THRAK,
the Double Trio predictably digs back into the Discipline-era catalog, with ʽIndisciplineʼ as the most sonically adventurous
track from the old days — everything else is mostly «weird pop»-style chestnuts
like ʽElephant Talkʼ and ʽFrame By Frameʼ. ʽSleeplessʼ gets a re-arranged
bridge section, with Fripp adding ʽDisciplineʼ-style jagged-angle guitar leads
to the formerly vocal-and-percussion-only arrangement; I do not think this
works well, because it disrupts the contrast between loud and quiet that was so
important in the first place. ʽHeartbeatʼ gets a romantic piano introduction...
wait, of course it ainʼt piano, it is just Adrian adding one more of those
beastly effects to his guitar (The Guitar
As Orchestra came out in 1995, so I suppose he was only too happy to
demonstrate some of that potential to a larger audience than his solo fans). And
the only true «oldies» are ʽRedʼ and ʽLarksʼ Tongues In Aspicʼ which they had
already played with the Eightiesʼ lineup — except that these ʽLarksʼ are actually preceded with ʽThe Talking Drumʼ,
successfully restored from the grave in all its demonic beauty.
On the whole, though, BʼBoom shares the dubious distinction of being that particular live
King Crimson album that is perfectly listenable and enjoyable all the way
through — and at the same time almost completely expendable. If there ever was
a reason to own and cherish it back in 1995, that reason has long since
evaporated with the release of tons and tons more interesting and less
predictable stuff. Instead of hunting after the audio album, it would probably
make much more sense to track down the (still widely available) video Deja VROOOM, documenting the bandʼs 1995
concert in Japan — it has almost the same setlist and gives you the added bonus of seeing the Double Trio in hot action.
No comments:
Post a Comment